Apocalyptic Survival Fiction: Count Down - The Concise Epitaph of Humanity (A Sci-Fi End-of-the-World Story) (A Dystopian Series)

by Watson, Oscar

  Eight – Define Your Greatest Accomplishments.

  I had expected the last question; this one kind of surprises me, as I looked at your arrival as being one of complete understanding of human hubris Instead, by differentiating accomplishment from advancement, you provide me with a broader tableau.

  Some would argue that those constructs and edifices we have built that can be seen from beyond the atmosphere would be considered our great accomplishments, and that you did not eliminate, damage, or destroy those that remain are perhaps vestiges of a similar view among you, our judge and jury. Others would say the objects, however, microscopic in comparison that we have flung out into the Solar system and beyond might be better examples of accomplishment, having covered greater distances in our short time here.

  Indeed, as in the last exercise, I must choose but three of our accomplishments to present to you because the arguments might go on too long otherwise. The first I would have to herald would be the landing on our satellite, the Moon, by humans would be our most impressive, but I would also have to argue that the Strategic Arms Limitations Talks, both the first and second installment, as well as the deep-sea discovery and retrieval of material from the long-sung HMS Titanic would round out the top three in my mind.

  In the first case, we, in infancy as a people, revered and in certain cases defied the Moon. That we reached out within ten millennia and touched down, left a mark on the moon, can arguably be one, if not the most impressive of our accomplishments. Considering the lack of knowledge about the inherent risks, we achieved not only escape velocity but astrogation when our technology was nearly nonexistent. The feat was so improbable that to this day there are those who have to believe it was falsified, that it never was accomplished. Indeed, the technology required to fake it would have been a greater feat at the time than the actual success of it.

  With the arguably most awful discovery of nuclear fission, the Earth was subjected to an arms race that might have ended, prematurely, the development of the human race. Nations lined up with these horrific weapons, at one point sufficient to completely annihilate the entire species four hundred times over. Though it might seem odd, I hold that the accomplishment, not only of a truce that would prevent the use of these world-killing weapons, but of an arrangement that over time would not only eliminate the thread of mutually assured destruction, but reduce the number of such weapons to a reasonably maintained level is, within human endeavor, one of our greatest accomplishments. The world was on the knife edge, close to self-destruction, and then, with words, the balance was struck, and suddenly safety reigned again. That is a clearly monumental accomplishment.

  Great tragedies often are just that. Losses that cannot be recouped in any fashion. Yet the outreach of some of the world’s richest, to redeem at least some of the treasures of what was the previous century’s worst, I would suggest is a great accomplishment. Not only do the descendants of the survivors have more of the past to look back on, now that those relics can be viewed on the surface, but those that did the search can be considered heroic in overcoming the challenges of operating so far beneath the sea.

  I assume you are somewhat aware of the loss of the HMS Titanic, but even without that knowledge, operating beneath the sea is as momentous as operating on the edge of space.

  Sir Edmund Hillary was quoted as saying that his reason to ascend to the top of Earth’s highest mountain was simply ‘because it is there’. I suppose this same reason could be stated for any of the human accomplishments ever attempted.

  But again, I perceive in your question something yet unasked… the reason for making such accomplishments a reality for ourselves.

  To that, I must relate again our communication, our desire to hear or tell a good story. It is not enough to say for one’s self that they made an attempt to do a thing; it is far more valuable, in terms of story merit, to have accomplished it. So from the literary point of Ben Franklin, who said if one wishes to be remembered, that person must write something worth reading, or do something worth writing about, and taking your decision to eliminate the reading element, you have left only the accomplishment, the doing something. And note that with humanity, your elimination of our written and collected memories, you effectively reduce our advances to mere physical action.

  I am going to take a risk here, and petition for a reconsideration on your part, of your current course of action. I am fully aware that your understanding is of a temporal, instantaneous nature, and you wish only to observe what happens here, now, and to not consider our writings, our recordings, historic, observational, or fictional. I understand your desire to instantaneously adjudge our fitness for survival. But I protest strongly on behalf of the written work, for it is how we can ascribe to learn, to know anything, by not having to replicate every mistake of our predecessors. Give us our documents, our writings, so that if we survive, we can learn, and if we are not to survive, at least we can try to grasp why this is so.

  We have but seven days left. Give us that one week to read our texts, whether or not we will survive. Give those of faith their writings, to hold onto. Give those who do not have faith the ability to make their own peace. If my words fail, it cannot be held to their account, but to mine alone. If my words succeed, it is because of the learning I have gathered from the others of my kind. Do not let us go into the darkness without a good bedtime story.

  Seven – Explain precisely what you are.

  Ask a hundred human beings, and you will have a hundred different answers. Asked of me, well, your individual answer will take on a hundred different facets.

  We are complex sentient beings, with varying levels of intellect, insight, and intensity. We share fundamentally common physical characteristics, but a broad array of sizes, colors, and temperaments. From an individual basis, we consider ourselves to be autonomous as adults, dependents as children, and disposable assets when elderly.

  We consider our own being to be as useful as our self-conscious identity can allow, to be at times as resourceful as a feral cat or as dependent as a mewling kitten. We are fundamentally divided between male and female, but personalities can turn that dissection into a continuum of variances and confusing categorization. We can be whatever the conditions warrant if we choose, or we can cut right down the line if we need.

  If the question is focused on the individual you regard as the chosen, the answer becomes even more confusing.

  I am a first-rate writer, given a monumental task that may well fall beyond my capacity to accomplish adequately. I am a personal coward whose fear of failure is only overwhelmed by my fear of success. I am a father and a son, a husband and a brother. I am a human being, a chronicler of this last work, and the final and ultimate accuser of our executioners.

  These are all words, terms one might ascribe someone they do not know. Yet you chose me from among more than seven billion people; you either don’t really care one whit about our response, or you already know a great deal about us, and chose me for some unfathomable reason of your own. It would do me well to think I am something special, and thus I will hold to that premise, which, therefore, leads me to believe this question, as with each one before, has some real underlying inquest of deeper meaning.

  But in these final days, this last week of existence perhaps, I have determined to become more than I am. In terms of expression, I hope to be a philosopher first, an apologist second, and petitioner finally. In terms of what I hope to accomplish in this essay, I plan on not only giving you the answer you need to offer us the benefit of the doubt, but to express in these sections perhaps the answers you are really seeking not the ones you articulated. In this case, what you appear to be seeking is not just who we think we are, but we would hope to become.

  That being the case, let me now delve into what that might be. In a less pleasant company, you might have worded it more brusquely, as in “Who do you think you are, advancing at such a slow and pathetic pace? You have no measurable impact on your stellar region, you barely
tolerate one another, you might as well just go ahead and off yourself with your internal combustion engine, your nuclear playthings, your inability to control your planetary climate”.

  I should apologize, particularly for the sarcasm in that last paragraph, but I won’t. I should even erase these two paragraphs, be more civil, but I won’t. You are not giving quarter, and I certainly won’t beg of it, per se. My statement stands, in that it certainly appears that these essays are more or less a game to you, some kind of “Russian roulette” – you could look it up, if you hadn’t eliminated our libraries. This is becoming a bit sickening to me, because I would expect a superior race whether alien, time travelers, or from another dimension to be curious, but also compassionate. IF all this is, is some attempt to cause an individual human to collapse under unreasonable strain from demands that exceed his or her station, you are succeeding, at least at this point.

  What do I consider myself to be? In this endeavor, I consider myself to be the last human being to have the opportunity to put into words the emotion, passion, aggression, and explanation for what we always hope to be. From our childhood, we all strive to be good people, sociable, friendly, and loyal. We strive to be exemplary in our actions, honorable in our interactions, profitable in our transactions, and just in our reactions. We don’t always do what is best, but we do what we feel is appropriate. We expect the best in others and the worst of ourselves. We see the inherent flaws in the systems we make, but we also expect and offer, for the most part, the benefit of the doubt to others on request. Until you came, we knew we were the top of the food chain, the top of the heap that is organic life. We did not endeavor to alter our ascendance, but rather to individually improve our state at every opportunity that does not mar our internal morality. IF we honor any Gods, we do so as best we can. If we do not, we do as best we can. Some follow a less stringent code of ethics, others strive to achieve even ascetic heights of mystery and spiritualism.

  For my part, I would say that what we consider ourselves is just human beings, doing one’s level best at being what we are. Living beings who have at our core understanding that things can get better. Or worse. On a macroscopic level, your interaction with us is fundamentally no different than a catastrophic thunderstorm, a globally significant asteroid collision or the gagging, choking death of a planet running out of oxygen.

  Things, for we human beings, are always changing. Your presence won’t be anything but a memory. If you choose to eliminate us, it will not have been our humanity that determined your course, it will be your own choice. You become human when you choose, one way or another. Welcome to the human race.

  Six – Explain Your Greatest Universal Contribution.

  Nearly halfway through, and now your questions are beginning to sound a bit snarky or sarcastic. You’ve no doubt observed us for some time, saw our written histories and the more recent computer files before you obliterated them. So again, this question seems to be delving for more, for perhaps our rationale, our justification. So rather than becoming indignant or defensive, or blindly rattling off a diatribe of what I think you might want to hear about our great moments, allow me to answer the question you didn’t ask.

  The greatest universal contribution we can ever make is to become a compassionate, conscientious, actively investigative and exploring race, using our short life spans to focus laser-sharp on the minutiae. Despite your destruction of our written history, the only benefit you have provided us with is a tabula rasa, a clean slate, ready to grow from what we believe to what we can learn, to re-evaluate our direction and our intent.

  Though your question asked for what we have done, suggesting a linearity of past events should justify a future direction, perhaps the greatest contribution, the justification for our continued existence into the future, is that we are ever the ‘old dog’. We can forever learn new tricks. Perhaps we came to the gunfight with a knife this time; knowing you as an adversary as an accuser, we will next time bring a rocket launcher. That may be actually why you have destroyed our libraries, our recorded works; you know that with time, we can adapt and alter our very being to fit the newer circumstances. It is perhaps our overconfidence in our abilities that is our downfall and our redemption. While circumstances may have us against a metaphoric wall, our indomitable will lift us to incalculable heights. Or dashes us against that wall until we figure out how to change the circumstances.

  Or, more likely, our greatest contribution is yet to be, an as-yet untapped potential that won’t make itself known for many more millennia. Countless life forms, no doubt, have achieved our meager level of technology, and perhaps led a less violent, more ‘profitable’ advancement. In truth, the human condition does have arrogance matched with a fair amount of sloth. Both are, according to common human religious tenets in opposition to godliness, so it may be that your nearer proximity to that level of existence puts us at odds. As a matter of course, I do note that you have given neither a means nor a seeming desire to share with us your own advancements, achievements, contributions… though technology far superior is evident, that does not adequately justify this inquisition, does it?

  I wonder if I further diverted from your agenda, and actually proposed an alternative to your two options – Advancement or Elimination. I wonder whether the concept of an ‘attitude adjustment’ might be in order. We clearly have the capability to do great things, achieve great goals, accomplish wondrous objectives, when properly motivated. Perhaps your visit, your inquest, can be the necessary catalyst for our propulsion to work toward that new goal. Perhaps you can revisit in a few centuries and reassess, now that we are aware of the possibilities. Would you even consider that? Or is your system so entrenched in its current ways that such would be an impossibility. I have noted that you have accepted my previous entries, although not all words directly address your question, so I wonder if the recording has anything to do with the questions you ask at all.

  If I have any understanding at all, it is that one learns from another when they have common ground, a structure for the communication to follow so as to allow all communicators the opportunity for feedback and coordination of the information, a means to cross-check or verify statements, assessments, and explanations made by the other. Yet in these five days, the only feedback I have received from you is that you have accepted my presentation, my essay for the day. But perhaps, as we are a problem-solving species, perhaps you have provided more insight and feedback than I originally had surmised. Humor me as I deduce the extent of your feedback thus far.

  We are successfully accomplishing the task you set for us (or more particularly, I have accomplished four of the required essays so far, and you have not refused them nor have you canceled or otherwise altered the project) so what I have been providing must be at least meeting with some minimal level of acceptance.

  The sequence of your questions thus far seems to be focusing particularly on the historic advances of human endeavor, and not on our particular worth as a species. I am appalled that you have eliminated ten thousand years of recorded accomplishments. I say eliminated, but perhaps you have archived them in some fashion, and if we succeed perhaps return them to us in a useful mode.

  That, of course, opens a whole new line of contribution… perhaps we are unique among all you have examined, and your treatment is defensive in nature. The fact that you are reaching out in our language is at once flattering and disturbing because it suggests not superiority or learning potential, but a desire to subordinate our successes to your superiority. Are you afraid of us, what we can and might do? Maybe you are really here as we would be, to change the rules of the game by altering the game condition, rather than continuing in a losing vein.

  One final thought on our greatest contribution… perhaps inquisitiveness, to the point of self-endangerment is our contribution. Perhaps your analysis can determine worth, or give you the data you seek. Let me just say that the loss of my own child makes this exercise seem more childish, as if you are coming to y
ounger species such as us to look for answers you yourself have long lost. Am I on the right track? Would you tell me if I was?

  Five – Outline Some of the Good Reasons for War.

  At last we come down to what I expected would be your first question since our science fiction, and indeed dramatic fiction of all kinds tend to circle the drain on this topic.

  Indeed, your first few questions seemed almost to ask for our technological progression, and warfare, the intended and strident act of breaking things and killing people might, to an external observer like yourself, seem our favorite pastime and our hotbed of creativity. While necessity is the mother of invention, as our saying goes, the winds of war breed chaos and distrust, not advancement and coherence. We are animalistic, which means that in our early ascendency, we did use warfare and war-making as tools to grow societally, to assimilate cultural diversity through assumption of command, but over the millennia we began to see that other methods might be, and indeed were, more effective, more efficient, and would over time result in the reduction of, and we hoped, eventually the elimination of warfare altogether.

  That you are asking for reasons, a term that suggests a commonality of philosophical terms, is another example of either a clever reach from you to glean deeper responses, or perhaps an acknowledgment that your processes are less arbitrary and more directed than they seemed to be. My compliments; your order of inquest has risen from a contemptible series of time-wasting diatribes to a serious discussion of the merit of human existence. Let’s pursue this question in earnest.

  War, the physical engagement between men of divergent views and beliefs in which one must win, and the other lose, rarely is as simple as that sounds. For the most part, it is fairly rare when two or more humans agree on more than a very few topics. But it is common for us to have particular issues we find objectionable, and in those cases, it is easier to get us to combine forces to end something we don’t like, rather than try to enforce something only a few do.